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Stinking Rose - tourist trap or local favorite?

While visiting SF last year we went to the Stinking Rose. The guidebook said it was good (this was before I discovered chowhound.com as a source of more reliable info) but the place was a huge disappointment. The place was virtually empty so they seated every customer in the fron window area to make it appear busy from outside. It was November so we were cold due to drafty windows. We also had a tiny table and felt claustrophobic. Now, I love garlic, but this place had probably the lousiest techniques for cooking with garlic I'd ever encountered despite their name and proclaimed specialty. The food actually tasted bland, with a bitter garlic undertaste. The service was terrible. The waiter was S-L-O-W, the hostess was a punker girl with black nail polish (I wouldn't care except it gave me a bad feeling about the place). I'm from NYC so I'm pretty weary of tourist traps aka Times Square, but I think we got ripped off in this place. I was just wondering how SFers feel about this place.

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